• CHERYL G. CRUZ
Parts of Bacolod City and Negros Occidental will experience a 12-hour power interruption on April 21, even as the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines placed the Visayas and Luzon grids on red alert for the third consecutive day.
The NGCP said it will shut down its Bacolod-Silay 69kV transmission line for preventive maintenance activities, starting at 6 a.m. on Sunday, that will affect the Ceneco’s Talisay, Panaogao, and Lopez substations.
The system operator, meanwhile, upgraded to red alert status the Visayas grid from 6-7 p.m. April 18, with Manual Load Dropping, or rotational brownouts likely, due to “higher forecasted demand”.
It said that 13 power plants are still on forced outage, while nine others running on derated capacities, for a total of 696.7 megawatts unavailable to the grid. “A red alert status is issued when power supply is insufficient to meet consumer demand and the transmission grid’s regulating requirement.”
The Visayas grid has been placed on red alert status for several hours in the evening since April 16, same as the Luzon grid.
“As previously noted, the extremely high temperatures have been affecting the operations of power plants in the grids,” the Department of Energy said April 18, as it urged everyone’s cooperation in minimizing power consumption especially at peak hours during the remainder of the hot season.
“The DOE continues to closely monitor and coordinate with the NGCP and all generation companies during this period of extreme heat, where electricity usage is at a record high. Power supply conditions have remained tight since April 16, resulting in the issuance of red and yellow alerts in the Luzon and Visayas grids,” it added.
Based on the NGCP’s monitoring, both the Luzon and Visayas grids reached all-time high peak demands for the year, so far, the DOE said in a statement. “The peak demand in Luzon was recorded at 13,222MW April 17 at 2:48 p.m., while the Visayas grid reached a peak demand of 2,525MW at 3:34 p.m.”
In the Visayas grid, the NGCP initially raised a red alert from 5-9 p.m. April 16, and the following night for the same duration.
“The DOE reiterated the directive of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for all government offices to take the lead in conserving energy and minimizing power use, particularly during this period,” Energy Secretary Raphael Lotilla stressed. “Industrial and commercial establishments are likewise encouraged to minimize the use of power during peak hours to help mitigate the impact of the supply shortage.” | CGC
